ms 



II o R T I (' T LTU I! I. 



I -•:;. 1919 



convenient. as furnishing a place for 

 the transaction of business and re- 

 ceiving mail, as well as a communi- 

 cating point, while visiting New York. 

 It has been used to a great advantage 

 meeting purposes, affiliated and 

 auxiliary societies also sharing in the 

 convenience. 



The Trade Exhibition. 

 Better evidence that business in the 

 florist trade is on a pre-war footing 

 could hardly be presented than is con- 

 tained in our trade exhibition of this 

 year. This exhibition has been given 

 an unusual amount of publicity in the 

 trade papers, in the society's Journal, 

 and in a series of about 16,000 form 

 letters which have been mailed over 

 the entire mailing list compiled for the 

 use of our publicity campaign, all with 

 a view of swelling the attendance at 

 this convention, and, inviting interest 

 in the society's work. 



NATIONAL FLOWER SHOW COM- 

 MITTEE. 



Chairman George Asmus presented 

 the report of the National Flower 

 Show Committee. 



There are several cities that are de- 

 sirous of securing this exhibition, some 

 of which have, or are to erect build- 

 ings suitable for our purpose. Your 

 committee feels that almost any city 

 in the union with the population of 

 600,000 or more, is capable of support- 

 ing our exhibition. 



The complexing question before the 

 committee is the one as pertaining to 

 the exhibits. I have been in touch 

 with the largest growing establish- 

 ments in the U. S., as well as a num- 

 ber of people who have been exhibitors 

 in the past national shows. I find that 

 there is a very great shortage of the 

 large sized plants that go to make up 

 our exhibitions. Then, too, the ex- 

 treme scarcity of plants of all descrip- 

 tions, and the prices obtained for 

 stock, has lead the committee to be- 

 lieve that it would be very difficult to 

 stage our exhibition until this condi- 

 tion changes. 



Now until our committee can safely 

 rely on the growing interest in sup- 

 porting the exhibition as it has in the 

 past, we cannot with any degree of 

 confidence start the wheels necessary 

 for the launching of one of these mag- 

 nificent undertakings. It would be an 

 ideal time when we are rocking the 

 country from coast to coast with our 

 wonderful publicity campaign, "Say it 

 With Flowers." to have this exhibition 

 blossom out in connection with it. 

 every two years in one of our leading 

 cities of this country. 



In making the above statement I am 

 quoting to you the opinion expressed 



to me by the various members of the 

 National Flower Show Committee at 



olicitation. Therefore it is very 

 important that this convention go into 

 discussion, so that the committee may 



omewhal enlightened from the 

 suggestions that will come from the 

 foremost men who are present. 



Your chairman believes that the 

 spring of 1921 would be the ideal time 

 for the staging of the next National 

 Flower Show. 



Finance Committee. 



The report of the finance committee 

 follows in part: 



It is my opinion that there has been 

 no work taken up by the National Or- 

 ganization that has meant so much to 

 every person engaged in our industry, 

 and that the campaign as inaugurated 

 by the Society in New York two years 

 ago, has brought results far beyond 

 our fondest expectations. 



To those of us who have had iu 

 charge the financing of this wonderful 

 project, it has seemed from the re- 

 sults obtained the first year, that we 

 ought to have easily had doubled our 

 first years quota of $40,000 by this 

 time. Over half of the year has passed 

 and we have now about $47,000 sub- 

 scriptions to date. If money sub- 

 scribed in the same proportion keep 

 up until the end of the year, it is pos- 

 sible that we may reach the $75,000 

 mark. 



Chairman Penn and his committee 

 are to be congratulated on having con- 

 tracted with the P. F. O'Keefe Agency. 

 It was Major O'Keefe of this agency 

 who recommended our slogan, "Say 

 it with Flowers," which is acknowl- 

 edged by the brightest advertising 

 men in the country as the best trade 

 slogan ever known by any commercial 

 industry, and which is rapidly becom- 

 ing a "by word" to the people of the 

 United States and Canada. I was 

 very much impressed to find that sev- 

 eral customers at our retail stores 

 when inclosing a card with flowers, 

 had used our slogan as one of the best 

 expressions they could think of in con- 

 nection with the gift. All of this ob- 

 tained with the expenditure of about 

 $60,000. The enormous amount of ad- 

 vertising matter that is appearing in 

 the magazines show that the advertis- 

 ing brains of this country, are unani- 

 mous in their opinion that this 

 medium ranks first. Evidently the 

 magazines are realizing this, as the 

 rates in most publications have ad- 

 vanced from 30 to 100 per cent. This 

 is another reason that there will hare 

 to be more money raised if we wish 

 to have the prosperous conditions the 

 trade is now in continue. 



Very few men in our profession a 



■ear or more ago thought that there 

 would be any building of greenhouses 

 for some time to come. And yet the 

 greenhouse builders are extremely 

 busy and behind with their work. 

 Considering the high rost of material, 

 this is evidence for itself of the suc- 

 cess of the campaign. 



Secretary Young has had to bear 

 the burden of this additional work. 

 He has done work that is truly won- 

 derful, and saved the subscribers 

 thousands of dollars. I wonder if the 

 business men in our profession have 

 ever stopped to consider that the 

 solicitation of the fund by mail and 

 otherwise, has cost them quite a few- 

 thousand of dollars, where this money 

 might have been spent for advertising 

 space. Articles have appeared weekly 

 in the trade papers pointing out the 

 fart, and yet despite all, the responses 

 have in no way been in proportion to 

 the results obtained. 



I wish to point out here a plan of 

 procedure that if adopted where pos- 

 sible, might help solve the problem 

 of equitable plan of assessment, and 

 whereby everybody pays his correct 

 proportion and allows for 75 per cent, 

 of the money so collected to be used 

 in the local community, through the 

 hard and earnest effort of President 

 Ammann. 



The St. Louis florists have adopted 

 a plan to charge every retailer pur- 

 chasing flowers at commission houses 

 for advertising. That is, if the retail 

 florist purchased $25 worth of flowers, 

 he would be charged 25c. for adver- 

 tising, the grower to be assessed one- 

 half of the 1 per cent, as his share. 

 The commission house as their share 

 are to be the collectors and distribu- 

 tors to an advertising committee who 

 have in charge the matter of properly 

 using it for advertising purposes. 

 Twenty-five per cent, of this fund is to 

 go to the National Publicity Cam- 

 paign. The balance to be used 

 locally. This method has also been 

 used in the City of Milwaukee, where 

 the results were so great and the in- 

 crease in the business so noticeable 

 that the amount assessed was doubled, 

 the only difference being that they 

 have not as yet decided to give 25 

 per cent, to the National fund. 

 Everybody pays exactly alike and in 

 proportion to the amount of business 

 done, and it is surprising with ever so 

 small an assessment the amount ob- 

 tained run into thousands of dollars. 

 At the last joint meeting of both of 

 our committees held in Cincinnati, it 

 was decided that the railroad travel- 

 ing expense of the two committees 

 was a very great expense, and I sug- 

 gested that the National Finance Pub- 



